Friday, June 2, 2017

Russian Federation Aggression Against Ukraine Began Not in 2013 but in 1991, Sungurovsky Says

Paul Goble

Staunton,
June 2 – Moscow began its efforts to undermine Ukraine not in 2013 in reaction
to the Maidan as many with Russian encouragement think but already in 1991, Kyiv
military expert Nikolay Sungurovsky says, because Moscow feared that “a
successful Ukraine would threaten the territorial integrity of Russia.”

Indeed,
Sungurovsky says, “attempts at destabilizing and weakening Ukraine from the
inside have not ceased over the course of its entire period of independence,” a
conclusion for which there is “official confirmation.”As Leonid Kravchuk, the first president of
Ukraine, said, “Russian policy always was and always will be anti-Ukrainian.”

Moreover,
the Kyiv military analyst continues, Moscow has used a variety of tactics
across the former Soviet space, ranging from propaganda directed at the
post-Soviet countries and to that directed at the West up to and including the
so-called “frozen conflicts” in Moldova, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Ukraine (glavred.info/chat/nikolay-sungurovskiy-435683.html).